The city is taking steps to ensure that food pantry services provided by the Henry Lee Willis Center at Plumley Village and Great Brook Valley can continue without interruption after the social service agency closes all its programs Feb. 6.

In a related matter, one city councilor has expressed concern about the future of property owned by the Willis Center in the city if the social service agency should end up dissolving.

City Manager Michael V. O’Brien told the City Council today night the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development is allowing the city to find a new provider of those services without having to go through a formal request-for-proposal process.

Timothy J. McGourthy, the city’s chief development officer, said HUD is also allowing the city to reallocate the balance of the federal Community Development Block Grant funding that had been contracted to the Willis Center for the provision of those food pantry services to the new provider through June 30.

“Come February we will have identified a new entity to do the food pantry work,” Mr. McGourthy said.

The Willis Center operates the Neighborhood Serv-Food Pantry on Tacoma Street in Great Brook Valley and the Neighborhood Serv-Plumley on Laurel Street.

Councilor-at-Large Frederick C. Rushton said a timely transition to a new provider will be important to the recipients of that service.

The Willis Center lost its state funding last month and will close all its programs and lay off 158 full- and part-time employees by Feb. 6. The state has not laid out its reason behind the decision to cancel contracts with the social service agency.

Mr. O’Brien said the state is the primary funder of the Willis Center — of its $12.6 million annual budget, $11.6 million came from four state agencies: Department of Public Health, Department of Child and Family Services, Department of Developmental Services and Department of Housing and Community Development.

The manager said the only service the city provides funding for, through its annual federal block grant program, is the two food pantries.

Mayor Joseph M. Petty said the state is overseeing transitioning all other services provided by the Willis Center to new providers and that is scheduled to be completed by the middle of next month.

“The transitioning is going forward and everything will by completed by the mid-February date,” Mr. Petty said.

Meanwhile, Councilor-at-Large Konstantina B. Lukes criticized state and federal agencies for their lack of transparency in making public details about why funding for the Willis Center has been withdrawn.

“I still don’t know what happened and why their funding was pulled,” Mrs. Lukes said. “I’m a little bit concerned about the process and the dynamics in that this has not been done in a public forum. I am perplexed to say the least about the lack of transparency from HUD all the way down.”

The councilor said she fears what might happen if the Willis Center should dissolve as an entity and sells off its property located in various neighborhoods.

She said she has heard the Southern Middlesex Opportunity Council being mentioned as a potential owner of those properties. She asked the city manager to contact the board of directors of the Willis Center to find out what its intentions are with the agency’s properties.

“We clearly need to know what is going to happen with the future of that agency,” she said.